Politics & Government
Citizens Discuss Neighborhood Relations, Other Issues at Community Meeting
Residents from Hopkins-Tancil and other areas of Alexandria spoke with mayor, acting city manager and police chief
Citizens met last week to discuss their concerns with Alexandria’s mayor, City Manager's Office and the police about recreation and housing opportunities as well as neighborhood relations.
Police Chief Earl Cook urged neighbors to work together to resolve their differences at the Thursday meeting held at the Nannie J. Lee Center.
Right now “is one of the lowest crime rates in the city. Every place we’ve been successful, it was community members walking across the street and changing it,” Cook said, alluding to some of the recent friction between residents of government-subsidized housing at Hopkins-Tancil Court and market-rate Chatham Square. “We’ve got in a posture that you want us to fix it. The people who fix their communities are the people who walk across the street and shake hands.”
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He said the police are there to help but it’s up to the community to take action too.
He added that “nuisance crimes” are “driving us crazy” and acknowledged “we have issues that we have to work on. My officers are part of the solution. We’re the people who help you fix it.”
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The meeting was scheduled before some of the recent tensions arose between neighbors in North Old Town to discuss recreation and housing issues, but the discussion largely centered on neighborhood relations.
While there are problems at Hopkins-Tancil, that area doesn’t have the crime problem that other parts of the city are having, according to Cook. He said the West End of Alexandria is experiencing almost two to three times the rate of crime as the other parts of the city. North Old Town “is a fairly law abiding community compared to the rest of Alexandria,” he said.
“Often people say all of the [police] resources are in Old Town because they are wealthy there, but actually that’s not true,” Cook said.
Acting City Manager Bruce Johnson said he met with residents of the North Alexandria Residents Coalition that afternoon and said the group might be interested in having a meeting with other residents of the city. “I think it would not have to be an official city working group or the press would be there and we’d be back where we started,” he said.
Several members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People attended the meeting, including Alexandria Chapter President John Chapman who suggested that the monthly meeting of civic associations in City Hall would be a “perfect opportunity” for this type of talk. There was some discussion that the NAACP might want to sponsor a meeting of the various parties.
“The city would be happy to participate,” said Johnson.
Mayor Bill Euille urged meeting attendees to come speak before City Council at open mike during Saturday morning council meetings to share their opinions.
One audience member expressed concern over future mixed-income housing that will sprout up in the city during the next five years.
“How is the city going to take proper measures in terms of how mixed income communities work – there needs to be some type of regulation” or guidance from City Council, she said.
Roy Priest, CEO of the Alexandria Redevelopment and Housing Authority, said it’s important that homeowners associations and residents associations work together.
Activist Lenny Harris said after the meeting that he was rallying voters to make changes on City Council because "no one has been concerned about housing."
He added, "In November, we're going to make a change by electing people who want to serve us."
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